(Newser)
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PayPal co-founder Peter Thiel hopes to stick around to enjoy a fortune estimated by Forbes at $2.2 billion into the 2080s at least. The venture capitalist and Facebook investor, 47, says he "certainly hopes to" live to 120 and is already taking steps to help him get there. Thiel tells Bloomberg TV he follows a paleo-like diet and limits his sugar—not eating sugar is, in his view, "the one nutritional rule." But he doesn't think paleo "gets you to 120," he says. He also takes human growth hormone daily, which "helps maintain muscle mass, so you're much less likely to get bone injuries, arthritis." As to concerns that HGH boosts the risk of cancer, "I'm hopeful that we'll get cancer cured in the next decade," Thiel says. (The San Jose Mercury-News points to a Mayo Clinic blog post that recommends "against using HGH to treat aging or age-related conditions.")

Thiel tells Bloomberg he also drinks red wine and runs on a regular basis. But he concedes technology and innovation are what will help us lead longer and healthier lives. His Founders Fund invests in several biotechnology companies: among them, the cancer-therapy-focused Stem CentRx and Modern Meadow, which hopes to eventually produce lab-grown meat—though "it's not yet clear whether people will eat it," he allows. When it comes to the longevity of businesses, he predicts Google will outlast Apple, Amazon, and Facebook. (The average life expectancy isn't even close to 120.)

I don't understand why someone as wealthy and knowledgeable as him is not looking at telomerase to cure aging. There are so many recent discoveries and achievements in this area. It doesn't focus on just making you healthier or treating health related issues, it actually cures the Aging disease. We are so used to aging as a normal process of living, that we never stop to think of it as a disease that can be cured.

Just_a_Voice

Dec 22, 2014 5:00 PM CST

Isn't the paleo diet the caveman diet? Weren't most cavemen dead by the time they were 47? Seriously though, good luck to him. Glad he's experimenting on himself instead of others.

ubik

Dec 20, 2014 5:00 PM CST

For long life, I would be more worried about societal collapse and a night of long knives against the billionaires. Recommend liberty over Obamaism for that, but who knows what will happen.